A Walking Weekend (Days 8 + 9)

I'm squishing Saturday and Sunday into one post, mostly because I didn't get around to blogging yesterday. Yesterday morning we were up and out by 9am even though it was Saturday, and the itinerary for the day got fairly messed up which threw the vibe of the group off quite a bit. We were running late in general and we were supposed to be done with activities around 1pm, but things ended up going until about 4pm, and boy did we do a lot of walking. By the end of the day everyone was pretty grumpy and tired, even the professors. 

We toured the Glasgow School of Art in the morning, which is absolutely beautiful and designed by Charles Mackintosh. I was practically moved to tears it was so wonderful, but we weren't allowed to take any photographs at all when were were there. I found out Mackintosh met Gustav Klimt in the early 1900s and I almost lost my mind, since Gustav Klimt is one of my favorite artists (if not my favorite) and some of Mackintosh's work was inspired by him. Our tour guide through the school was a recent graduate whose name was Abdi, and he was very passionate about the building and the artwork within it, which made the tour very fun to be a part of.  

We also went to a religious museum and a church called Govan, which had many large rocks and carved headstones in it. Let's just say an hour tour of just rocks was a little too much for some of us to handle and, even though some of it was very interesting, a lot of other parts dragged on for far too long. Me and two of my friends took a 3 hour nap when we got back and then spent the rest of the evening working on homework. 

Today was a much more relaxing and enjoyable day. We slept in, ate a quick breakfast, and then attended a church service with a few other members from the group and our professors. We ate lunch with the congregation afterward and had tea, and then walked around and looked at different shops for a lot of the afternoon. I found a great spoon that I bought for 50 pence, and I'm really excited about it since it's vey different from any that I've ever had! Six of us walked with Dr. Kuess next to Clyde River and he read us some Scottish poetry. The picture above is him leading us down a path to get next to the River. It's wonderful spending time with him since he lived in Scotland and knows so much about the cities we visit -- walking with him and spending time with him means I'm always learning something new, which I love. We also walked through the Scottish Botanic Gardens which are free and open to the public. The green house had plants from all over the world, including a room labeled "killer plants" for the ones that eat bugs (definitely my favorite part). 

The rest of the afternoon will be spent doing homework and possibly going to the Sauna that's in the hotel. Also, I've haven't been feeling well recently -- the whole trip my balance has been a little off and I feel like I occasionally suffer from tiny spells of vertigo. Today I was also experiencing chest pains. If you guys could send a few prayers my way that I'll be fully restored to health, that would be wonderful! It's nothing serious but I do notice it and it is rather bothersome. 

That's all for now!